KYSERIKE, N.Y. -- Rondout Valley High School teachers who addressed the school board this week praised the district's distribution of iPads to the freshman class, saying the tablet computers help them engage introverted students, keep special education students organized and provide tools for research and slideshows in the classroom.

The district spent nearly $100,000 to provide the tablets to about 175 ninth-graders and 22 fourth-graders in September in a pilot project designed to teach students 21st century skills and address the "digital divide."

Including applications and protective cases, each iPad cost the district about $500, which amounts to about $98,500, said Alan Baker, the district's technology director.

Early in the year, teachers involved in the initiative were bogged down with testing requirements associated with the state's new teacher evaluation system, Baker told the board on Tuesday, but since then, the Ninth Grade Academy has been meeting every week to go over how to use iPad2 applications in the classroom, he said.

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Chris Frenza, a global studies teacher, said his students are able to create 10 slide presentations in one block with the "Keynote" application and that he uses another app, called "So Creative," to evaluate his pupils' progress at the end of each class.

Frenza said he poses four questions to the class and gets a real-time data report back from his tablet charting student progress and showing him which students got the question wrong. That gives him a chance to adjust the entire direction of his lesson if necessary and give help to individuals who need it.

"It gives me immediate feedback as to what the students are doing in class, and I can quickly change the way I'm teaching," Frenza said.

Frenza also spoke of a similar application, called "Socratic," which he uses to poll the class. He credited the approach with involving introverted students who are too shy to raise their hands in lessons while at the same time giving him a better handle on their progress.

Frenza also spoke of the value of putting all of the information on the Internet at his students' fingertips.

"One student, I noticed every time I looked up, was on his iPad," Frenza said. "So I said, 'Let me see that thing,' and I went through his search history. For the last 15 minutes of my lecture, any time I said something, he went and Googled it and was reading about it as I was continuing on."

Megan Berean, a special education teacher, said by allowing students to email her at any time during the school day, the iPads have helped students who might be too embarrassed to ask questions during class discretely receive guidance and generally have "opened the lines of communication."

And like Frenza, Berean said her class has gone "paperless" with an application called "eBackpack," through which students can electronically submit assignments to teachers and teachers can electronically respond with feedback.

The application also allows Berean to place assignments directly in her students' calendars to help them stay organized, she said.

Fourth-grade teacher Kristina Flick cited similar benefits. She said her pupils have adapted to the technology quickly and that providing iPads to students at a young age should make using the equipment second nature.

One challenge raised by Berean, though, was the need to train her students in "how to regulate their use and how to use it appropriately."

Baker said two students have maliciously destroyed their iPads and are being required to pay for them and that three were accidently damaged beyond repair and replaced.

District Superintendent Rosario Agostaro said the current plan is to issue another round of iPads to the 2013-14 freshman class. He said he also intends to discuss longer term-plans with the Board of Education.

The goal is for the entire high school student body to be equipped with iPads over the next few years, but Agostaro said new computer testing requirements going into effect in 2014-15 could result in district officials beginning to issue the tablets to younger students to help the district comply with those requirements.

Agostaro also spoke of possibly creating a "bring your own device" policy in future years to allow students who have their own tablet or laptop computers to bring them to school for academics, allowing the district to focus its resources on expanding technology access to students whose families cannot afford the equipment.